Yemen Doubts Houthi Commitment To Ceasefire, Calls For Implementing Mechanism - Ambassador

ST PETERSBURG (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 21st November, 2018) The Yemeni government is skeptical about the commitment of the Houthi rebels to implement the new ceasefire without a clear implementation mechanism which should be adopted at the upcoming peace talks in Sweden, Yemeni Ambassador to Russia Ahmed Salem Wahishi told Sputnik on Wednesday.

The Houthi rebels said on November 19 that they were halting drone and missile strikes on the Saudi-led coalition at the request of the United Nations.

"Any ceasefire without a clear implementing mechanism will only be a wishful rhetoric and impractical, given that the Houthi rebels have violated all previous nine truces, as well as this last one, and have undermined all agreements and commitments," Wahishi said.

The ambassador stressed the need for a single package of measures to be issued at the upcoming peace talks in Sweden, as well as for a clear implementation mechanism.

Last week, UN Special Envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths announced that both the Yemeni government and the Houthis, officially known as the Ansar Allah movement, were committed to attending the consultations, which the envoy said would reconvene in Sweden shortly.

The talks will follow the UN attempt to hold peace consultations in Geneva in September, which was abandoned as Houthis said they were prevented from leaving Yemen. The claims were denied by the Saudi-led coalition which controls airspace over Yemen since March 2015.

Yemen has been gripped by a civil war between President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi's government and the Shiite Houthi movement since 2015. The government is backed by the Saudi-led coalition that has been carrying out airstrikes that target areas controlled by the Houthis since March 2015.